Bangladesh to tackle BNP's extremism with 'resilience'

Bangladesh on Wednesday told the UN Human Rights Council that it will handle the BNP-sponsored "violent extremism" with its "characteristic resilience and determination".

Foreign Minister A.H. Mahmood Ali told a meeting in Geneva on Wednesday that the alliance of Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) and Jamaat-e-Islami was promoting a "violent extremist agenda in the name of political movements", bdnews24.com reported.

He said the people of Bangladesh "maintain their resolve not to submit to these forces".

Ali said the clique was out to destroy the "non-communal, non-confrontational and pluralist identity" of Bangladesh that the current government was trying "to revive and construct over time".

The minister was referring to the ongoing political activities of the 20-party coalition that boycotted the last parliamentary elections and also the brutal murder of the writer-blogger Avijit Roy.

He said Roy's killing was "a variant manifestation of this viciously self-serving agenda".

The foreign minister's speech at the top UN human-rights forum was the first after Bangladesh was elected member in last October for the third time.